Waking up at 9 to be on time for my stepfathers birthday wasn't easy it wasn't the cold that stopped me just fact that this day was going to be extremely long!
we got there on time as my mother was getting ready we had to Wait for an aunt of mine and went to the cemetery pay our last respects and as we were about to walk back to our cars it started raining and hailing and snowing so hard.
Getting back home was a complete different ball game it took as 2 hours. when back home i had to run out to get the last things i needed for roisin murphy and sonny's birthday party that i had been planning all week.
Meeting up with sonny running round the city going home to get my clothes and then going to Jsn's place for some take out Italian and gift swapping.
Off to Rosin it was the concert was overall boring we missed half an hour of HERCVLEZ and love affair whom are amazing and i was very disappointed we missed out on that. Rosin came on looking beautiful just like she always does the stage was a bit to large for her performance so she did half of it one side and went off stage afther 4 songs to change it took here 7 minutes... i wast so disappointed and annoyed by the crowd that i left early.
we arrived 2 hours late at Sonny's own birthday party but nevertheless had an amazing time! A big thnk you to everyone who came a made it possible!!
Browsing around I found this little movie made by Nick Knight and Naomi Campbell. I guess the industry is waking up... but there is a hundreds of black, Asian, Arab, and Indian models out there are all our eyes wide shut?! Read it and weep...
last week was a good week now what will this week bring... Rosin Murphy and after Sonny's birthday... a little bit of acting on Saturday and million dollar kids on Saturday evening. Doesn't seem like much does it lets just wait and see what happens.
Chanel realeased a new line of bags and accessories under the label "Chanel Unlimited".
The bags are made of a "glossy gray canvas material." They're plastered in not just one, but many logos."
You can have hobos, clutches, mini and maxi bags, even a large garment bag littered with words like "Coco," "Paris," "31 Rue Cambon," and of course, "Chanel." They feature "exquisite details" like inside pockets, leather reinforcements and invisible zip fastenings. Details that are, you know, so hard to find in other purses.
So there are like Gucci with Chanel's name allover them.
It seems USSR VOGUE isn't just stepping up its game but really making its self noticed! even though were not able to read it. We can still look at it. Look at this. NAOMI CAMPBELL ones more on the cover and if we could define a FIERCE, FEROSHA and more then ever JEANIUS shoot. Another beauty shot on the cover just the way it should be on the cover of VOGUE. Russia is stepping up its game!
But note even though it might seem they are doing better lately this want the first time they did NAOMI.
I'm at a point in my life where what i do today defines on what i be able to do tomorrow. What to do and say at the right moment and time always seems a trick. Being myself seems to be the answer.
I've posted quit a few blogs on what people think of me and the way people see me. But how do i look at myself? how do i see myself. I have different perspective overall. I seem to disagree with the overall norm of how to do certain things. I don't think school has to be the answer to everything just like having years of experience doesn't mean you can always do a good enough job.
Go to art school and become a designer an artist. go to bossiness school and become an entertainer. I say look at Yves Saint Laurent and make an attempt to try and keep up.
This passed week has been quit impressive. Its been fun, hard and overall difficult. Doing some shoots, filming, shopping and a hell of allot of work. So no complaints form me.
This week I've been meeting friends form all over old friends and new ones. seeing allot of some people and running into some people i rarely or never get to see. I've learned quit a few things about people that i thought a knew and gotten to know thing about people i didn't know very well and found out i dint know at all.
As much as i am an open person and know that i am more then willing to read an open book with an open mind i find it very easy to reach a certain conclusion, meaning if you act a certain way expecting the people around you to either join in do the same or be with you every step you take think twice. My mother always told me i was born alone and alone i will die. People tend to make chooses in there lives and it is up to you if you want to join in and follow or make your own choice and stand by this.
Sex drugs and rock and role...there is more to life. You choose who you have sex with you choose if you take drugs or not and if all your friends do the same or none of them do. Don't feel alone, or scared. don't get agree or feel betrayed. The main reason we are friends is based on what we do, what we mean and how much we actually care about one another and oneanother's values.
for few friends i put my hand in a giant mountain of needles Enough sentimental shite...
remember when we used to go out evry week and once a month we did out best to look good actualy buying or making a new outfit for M.U.L.T.I.S.E.X.I i miss that...
For those who missed it. Coco Rocha in NYC, May 2008
VISIONAIRE INVITED 12 ARTISTS TO SPLASH THEIR IMAGERY ACROSS A SERIES OF LACOSTE POLOS, THE MATERIAL WOULD SHUT DOWN A FRENCH FACTORY AND END UP ON THE WALLS OF GAGOSIAN.
artists who contributed, they weren’t the obvious choices and their work isn’t the kind normally seen on clothing. The list is a mix of creative individuals: musicians, filmmakers, painters, fashion designers, twelve in all.
Karl Lagerfeld, René Lacoste, sketched a portrait of him; the crocodile, which was Mr. Lacoste’s nickname, serves as his left eye. Michael Stipe offered a photograph he took of the audience at one of his concerts. Pedro Almodóvar worked with the art director Juan Gatti, who designs his title sequences, on a collage of his films. David Byrne, who loves Las Vegas, decided on a map of the city that runs from heart to liver. The artist Thomas Ruff sent in an image of the Grand Canyon that, curiously, comes into focus only from far away. Thomas Demand, who builds life-size models of interiors and exteriors, then photographs the construction before destroying it, used an image of artificially lit paper leaves to create an effect that looks almost like camouflage. Phil Poynter, who shoots the Lacoste ads, photographed Angela Lindvall in a pool—the photo makes the shirt look as if it were underwater too. Peter Lindbergh offered one of his more iconic images—a shot of Linda Evangelista from a 1988 Comme des Garçons ad campaign. The artist T.J. Wilcox used one of his striking, color-drenched collages that were shown at Metro Pictures gallery last fall. Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin collaborated with the graphic design team M/M (Paris) to produce a nude image overlaid with psychosexual doodles. Photographer and SHOWstudio founder Nick Knight sent in an image of an exploding flower. Richard Phillips, painted Coco Rocha.
This shoot Feels AMAZING its not so much the styling. It all seems work. the way the Pictures have been taken the cloths, the colours and the Model. A necessary visual change up that screams; past, present and future!
Photography; Karl Lagerfeld Styling; Charlotte Stockdale Model; Raquel Zimmermann
This story appears in V56 so don't min the Cover and just Buy buy buy!
all the names written above had the main focus in " PARIS IS BURNING " but what happened when the camera stopped filming and life continues did they get recognition did there dream come true? did they survive?
Dorian Corey; Dorian died of AIDS in New York, 29 August 1993. After Corey's death, the mummified body of Robert Worley (aka Robert Wells), was found in Corey's belongings with a gunshot wound to the head
Pepper LaBeija; Pepper Suffered from diabetes for many years and had both feet amputated before dying of a heart attack in New York, May 14 2003
Willi Ninja; The most successful of all the characters. The movie served as a springboard for Willi. He parlayed his appearance into performances with a number of dance troupes and choreography gigs. His style served as an inspiration to Madonna, who used it in her 1990 hit song and music video "Vogue." Willi was a featured dancer in many music videos including Malcolm McLaren's "Deep In Vogue" and "I Can't Get No Sleep" by Masters At Work featuring India. In 1994, he released his single "Hot" (another Masters At Work production) on Nervous Records. Willi's later career included runway modeling for Jean-Paul Gaultier, performing with dance companies under Karole Armitage, providing instruction to Paris Hilton on perfecting her walk. He opened a modeling agency, Elements of Ninja, in 2004, and made an appearance on The Jimmy Kimmel Show. Willi was also prominently featured in the 2006 documentary release How Do I Look directed by Wolfgang Busch. Ninja died of AIDS-related heart failure in New York City on September 2, 2006.
Octavia St. Laurent; Octavia is the only one that is still alive. She was featured in the 2003 release of the documentary How Do I Look, she was using the name Heavenly Angel Octavia St. Laurent Manolo Blahnik. She discusses her drug use, sex work, and fight with AIDS
Angie Xtravaganza; Angie/Anji Xtravaganza died in New York at age 27 from an AIDS-related liver disease
Venus Xtravaganza; Died in 1989.According to her drag mother Anji Xtravaganza, Venus Xtravaganza was found strangled and stuffed under the bed in a New York hotel in 1989. Her body was discovered by a stranger four days after her death.
In May 2007, Beyond Belief, an exhibition of Hirst's new work, opened at the White Cube gallery in London. The centre-piece, a Memento Mori titled For the Love of God, is a human skull recreated in platinum and adorned with 8,601 diamonds weighing a total of 1,106.18 carats. Approximately £15,000,000 worth of diamonds were used. It was modelled on an 18th century skull, but the only surviving human part of the original is the teeth.
In June 2007, Hirst gained the auction record for the most expensive work of art by a living artist — his Lullaby Spring, a 3 metre (10 ft) wide steel cabinet with 6,136 pills, sold for 19.2 million dollars to Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar.
The asking price for For the Love of God was £50,000,000 ($100 million or 75 million euros). It didn't sell outright,[32] and on 30 August 2008 was sold to a consortium that included Hirst himself and his gallery White Cube
Series one Next month fragrance company Symrise -in collaboration with creative agency Metaproject and Joseph Quartana of Seven New York -will release the fragrance colection 'Six Scents', six new fragrances created by Gareth Pugh;Diagonal, Bernhard Willhelm;Wickon 3000, Jeremy Scott;illicit sex, Alexandre Herchcovitch;Urban tropicalia, Cosmic Wonder Light Source;The spirit of wood, Preen; Teen spirit. The 'Six Scents' project has been founded to raise money for our first creative International HIV/AIDS Awareness Education Center, to be opened in Antwerp Belgium next year.
It will be sold globaly in exlusive shops such as; collete Paris France || Seven New York ||Reborn, Montreal, Canada All over japan and in all the Alexandre Herchcovitch in brazil.
New york 1987 Paris Is Burning 1990 documentary directed by Jennie Livingston
"I remember My dad telling me you have 3 strikes against you in this wold every black man has 2. That their just black and male. But your black, and your male, and your gay and your gonna have a hard fucking time. He said if your gonna do this your gonna have to be stronger then you ever imagine."
"Get off the floor, Get off the floor. Learn it and Learn it will."
the 2 opening lines and to be best quotes through out this movie. i have to say its not so much about fashion or dance other then it is about being gay in a certain time in New York. throughout the movie there way of life is explained there dreams are spoken of.
Like they say This movie is about the "ball" circuit.
The movie features Dorian Corey, Pepper LaBeija, Willi Ninja, Octavia St. Laurent, Angie Xtravaganza and Venus Xtravaganza. The movie is mostly about how its subjects deal with the adversity of racism, homophobia and poverty. In the end, an open end. You have no idea what happens with all of the different characters or there dreams except for Venus Xtravaganza. Sins most of my friends read my blog i will update on how most of there lives ended up.
I don't want to type to much about this movie. Just Go see it! just like i will see it again.
Yesterday me and Majid attended the Dutch fashion awards which proved to be a long agonising investment in dutch fashion. An award ceremony that this country needs and that shows we have potential. but if the outcome is as just, that seems to be another Question. making sure that not only the designers but the whole industry including the stylists and media understood that we need a boost not only creative wise but also in our state of mind. One the international judge's asked the dutch fashion industry to "step up" as she so lightly put it.
After all the runway shows. At the ceremony they elect a best dressed man and woman this was presented by an actor who couldn't pronounce the name of the Dutch designer he was wearing. Sins the best man wasn't a shock to me and wasn't at all what i think just. i will only post best female who did not only win but also made a statement worth remembering.
shown here not just asking everyone to step up there fashion game but making people hear her by making sure they understood what she was talking about not just dressing up for the event that took place but dressing up everyday! thus making this country more of a fashion forward place to live and create.
Majid, Sonny, Aynouk, Marco and myself had a little talk after an opening we went to today check sonny's blog he will post that.
We had an amazing talk about dutch fashion and out position in it. About how the current situation in our sober country. that doesn't seem to know anything about fashion what so ever. you would think that in an open minded country like our little Holland where we have prostitutes and drugs you would be able to walk down the street in what ever you want to wear without having people coming after you or just plain screaming at you.
Questions were asked, questions like;"do we believe in dutch fashion?"," do we believe in dutch fashion designers?", " do we believe that this little country can handle international fashion?". different magazines here in Holland are loosing the interest of the fashion in crowd making the boring or irrelevant. And other magazines are stopping completely. Allot of different answers were given. because we shared some opinions and other times we didn't share the same opinion at all.
Looking at magazines not just nationally but internationally is vogue still in power if so who still buys it and why? What about magazines like self service and purple they seem to get allot of attention lately and not in a bad way at all look at Visionaire's masterpiece V-magazine.
Made in Holland, we have great arctics and interior designers. but what about our designers, Victor and Rolf whom don't even have a store in The Netherlands, spijkers and spijkers what else do we have to offer is this enough and if so should we support them with all that we can?
Should we make this country a fashion country by spending all our time trying to better it? and if so how? and why?
it was one of the best talks we had as a group in a long time and sitting there seeing the hopelessness and hope most some of us made me think.
We started by ordering drinks and toasting our new president cause no matter how you turn in America is the worlds police state and who becomes president there has influence on all of us.
This made clearer to me that fashion and politics as i believe have more to do with each other then most people want to believe. 1 of us spoke about wanting to build a fashion base in the Netherlands the other said to have been trying to do that for the past 5 years and is giving up without hope. the other said after all the No's and we can't sell WOW how much longer do people expect us to go abroad be able to do work there and come back because they believe in you then and do it here. The Netherlands to us is like most countries are to lots of other people we have the capital and some other cities where you can dress up go out and have stuff to do. we can dress our self the way we would normally do and go wherever and do whatever People here will let you know your strange weird or not welcome. and that's just talking about the people who have no direct link to fashion whats-o-ever. there are tuns of people in the fashion industry here who keep the mass as were calling it. Dumb! magazines like the Elle girl who were actually doing good educating our younger generation with the who is who and from then on choosing what you like. up against people who just want to make an extra buck in a way that is fashion degrading we have had numerous fashion makeover TV shows for the mass and they are still doing it now. lots of money zero creativity. making is farmer understand MARGIELA, Balenciaga or even something as simple as Dsqueared seems to be impossible to some of us but to other the reason why they are here.
At a certain point my best friend Sonny (A.K.A the optimist) said and asked;"i have a bad time looking at things in a negative i feel there are always things we can work with. " after he asked " You seem so negative about The Netherlands do you believe in our countries Creatives at all?"
coming form Sonny this question was a bit of a shock but not a surprise I do believe in what we have to offer but if we have to stay in Holland fight till there is no one els to fight and start fighting again to try and make farmers understand " La MODE" is something els. i want to see the world so i am not scared of doing what i want to do with my life abroad. I feel this country has offered the world great Art in architecture in interior and furniture design look at Rembrandt and van Gogh. we have designers that are working all over the world yes we are a fashion country in allot of ways but never the less people do not stay here.
Lucas Ossendrijver amazing at Lanvin, Wilbert Das at diesel Both working abroad. We have amazing Photographers bast or from the Netherlands all over the world, great makeup artists working more abroad then here. Holland also has a great mass of Models but every agency knows if our want your model to work he/she does not stay here.
I want to tank Majid, Aynouk, Sonny and Marco.
Picture: Butt magazine published and printed in The Netherlands, available world-wide.
Update! im gooing to post all the diffrent oppinions on my Blogg.
Somethimes is sooooo extremely difficult to stay optimistic about a country that sells awnsers like: " That's too mutch fashion, Maybe that's too dark, That's too conceptual". Now I'm only talking about the fashion incrowd let alone al the Farmers and Lame unknowing people. The main thought in my head is: "Just keep breathing untill you get there (out of the Netherlands)". Yes I think we can put a lot of efford in this country, but do we really want that and more important, Does thsi Country want that?
The Curtains are down but the show isn't over yet.
Its the 5th of November 2008. The first black president in the history of the USA has be elected. to many a great achievement and a Major step forward in most race issues internationally.
As a black man, as an European baste black man who was born in the former center of slave trading for the world. I must say that i am very delighted and joyful because of this.
As a human been i think and hope that true Obama being president the wold will change for the better.
Last weekend me and my friends had dinner at a friends house it was a very nice idea sins we don't do this enough. i think we had dinner with the 9 of us and 2 other people arrived later. we had a great meal and for the one reason or the other we started to talk about politics. being that most of us sitting as this table were fashion people i expected the conversation to die out before it could get anywhere near being meaningful. To my surprise 2 guys that were sitting in front of me kept the conversation going long enough for me to reach a point where i had to stop talking.I can't blame my friends for not being interested or not caring.
I believe that what i am going to do with my life will have meaning not just in the group that i seem to be put in because i look a certain way.Or am interested in certain things. I refuse the see things in black and white but i am realistic enough to know that no everything is a sweet dream. I truly believe that fashion is more then, what trend are we doing now,how much money can we make, or how will we be able to provoke the mass now basics. In a speech given by Pierre Berge not to long ago he said "not to know if fashion was art". It largely depends on the definition of art. I believe that in his early and best years Yves Saint Laurent was an artist juts like Christian Dior, Mademoiselle Chanel and Cristobal Balenciaga before him. its one thing to create a dress its another to create a new silhouette.
today everyone is into politics making it mode. making it the "IT" subject of the moment for many its everyday and for America it should have been the "IT" subject at least for the past 8 years. For everyone who loves policies today. I hope your prepared for the upcoming 4 to 8 years i hope your ready for tomorrow.
here you have a few pictures of designers that i like. they answered to the question; With the global economy in a "transitional" state, how do you think fashion will change in the year ahead.
Thom Browne "I don't know what the future of men's fashion will be like. I just hope that everyone does their own thing… Because that is what I'm going to do."
Raf Simons "It will be a reality check. It will be creativity versus reality. Can they meet in this moment? How will they meet? But in any case, even in this climate, we have to give the audience beauty and something to be excited about and something that stimulates. Enough reasons already to think dark."
Dries Van Noten "We could hope that the current sartorial individualist attitude of men's dressing will continue. Yet what was almost exclusively sharp, angular, and urbane may now be beginning to melt ever so slightly around the edges. There may, in parallel, even be a subtle slide toward the conceptual."
Jeaniuss "Most people don't feel the pain directly, and hope to being able to keep leading the shopping life they do. I'm hoping designers will follow there journey in there own creativity if this causes to make clothes cheaper then so be it. Men that buy higher end brands spend that extra penny anyway so i say create make it great and never less Jeaniuss"
I have waited for this ever sins i found a picture of my mother with a high top fade. my father had a book on here and after loosing my fear i started to ask question's. He had a crush on her. She never got forgotten and she never will be. She is the The one and only Grace Jones.
Update!
9 tracks shortest being almost four minutes and longest a little bit longer then six and a half minutes. Her album is exactly what i expected it to be i like it very much!
Meeting you over 2 years ago wasn't just coincidence I love you more each day we spend together and, i care for you like a real friend should. I hope the world is ready for us and all we have to offer.
For all the up coming collaborations Sonny, myself and our soon to be blogged to death third link Majid Karrouch will bring you.The shoots we have done and have planned for the up coming months, MYKROMAG, and our Exclusive invite only party. Be prepared!
Above some pictures we made in Palais de Tokyo during fashion week.
